Gil's Thrilling (And Filling) Blog
Follow the Culinary Ruminations of New Mexico's Sesquipedalian Sybarite. 1162 Restaurant Reviews, More Than 11,100 Visitor Comments…And Counting!
When my friend David Wagner, author of the spell-binding Rick Montoya Italian mysteries, invited us to dinner at the Shamrock Brewing Co. in his hometown of Pueblo, Colorado, I quickly leapt to the conclusion that …
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If your perception of Colombia is of a nation beleaguered with drugs, terrorism and violence, you may just have to recalibrate your thinking. In 2014, for the second consecutive year, a WIN-Gallup poll conducted in …
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“Why don’t they pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting anybody from learning anything? If it works as well as prohibition did, in five years Americans would be the smartest race of people on Earth.” ~Will Rogers …
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In May, 2018, Yelp published its listing of the 50 best restaurants in Albuquerque. Only three of them came from the not-yet-done-revitalizing East Downtown (EDo) district. The two that won’t surprise anyone are The Grove …
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In the millennium year, after years of planning and lobbying, the dream was finally realized of a haven dedicated to the preservation, promotion, and advancement of Hispanic culture, arts, and humanities. In 2000, the National …
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“People aren’t either wicked or noble. They’re like chef salads With good things and bad things chopped and mixed together In a vinaigrette of confusion and conflict.” ~ Lemony Snicket, The Grim Grotto Before launching …
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“It feels so true when I’m with you I’m free A place I go that feels like home to me It feels so true It’s time well spent when I’m with you.” ~Feels Like Home …
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“Whoa! I feel good, I knew that I would, now I feel good, I knew that I would So good, so good, ’cause I got you So good, so good, ’cause I got you So …
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In the parlance of the pugilist, “punchy” is synonymous with punch-drunk, the result of having been battered violently by an opponent. You know, like Rocky Balboa after a few rounds with Apollo Creed. Don’t ever …
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Exterior signage for Dennis Apodaca’s new restaurant venture sports the name of the previous tenant, a short-lived eatery named MIXX. In a February blurb announcing Dennis’s return, the Albuquerque Journal called his new venture “REMIXX.” …
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Now I lay myself down to sleep I pray oh lord my soul to keep Cause if I should die before I wake I hope up in Heaven they’ve got lobster and steak It’s a …
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The teeth, tail and eye of the tiger caused quite an uproar in the Sandia National Forest near Tijeras, New Mexico back in 2015 and it made the national news. A mountain biker took a …
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As we wended our way along meandering Rio Grande Boulevard, I commented to my Kim, “I sure miss Ichabod and Katrina.” “Colleagues of yours at UNM?,” she asked. “No, not colleagues,” I replied pointing to …
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Over the years, perhaps no restaurant across the Land of Enchantment has garnered as much recognition from the national media as has El Pinto. Rather than recap all its accolades across the years, let’s focus …
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“Are you going to explain how to pronounce “bosque?,” my Kim asked when she espied me working on this review. Though her Spanish vocabulary is rather limited, she pronounces the five or six hundred Spanish …
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Before permanent signage was mounted, a tethered banner in front of K’Lynn’s Southern & Cajun Fusion in Rio Rancho listed a few of the delicious treasures available in the tiny restaurant: “catfish, BBQ, gumbo, po …
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I think a rotisserie is like a really morbid ferris wheel for chickens. It’s a strange piece of machinery. We will take the chicken, kill it, impale it and then rotate it. And I’ll be …
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My dad taught me very early on that all people have inherent worth and dignity and are deserving of respect and kindness. A lifelong educator, he had a knack for reaching students deemed incorrigible or …
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Shortly before 6AM. on July 16, 1945, some of the world’s most brilliant minds ushered in the nuclear age with the detonation of the first atomic bomb, an occasion which later prompted Los Alamos Laboratory …
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Even though New Mexico’s license plates have been graced with the sobriquet “Land of Enchantment” since 1941, it didn’t become the state’s official nickname until 1999. For much longer than that, the more derisive epithet …
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“No one who cooks, cooks alone. Even at her most solitary, a cook in the kitchen is surrounded by generations of cooks past, the advice and menus of cooks present, the wisdom of cookbook writers.” …
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My friend Schuyler jokes that because the diet of my formative years was mostly beans, chile and tortillas as well as chile, tortillas and beans, I’ve developed an insatiable curiosity and appetite for anything that …
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In retrospect, the monsters and bogeymen who frightened impressionable children of my generation were pretty lame. Perhaps the most lame of them all was Frankenstein, a lumbering behemoth who walked around with his arms outstretched …
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Reclusive American poet Emily Dickinson insisted a light exists in spring that’s not present at any other time of year. If you’ve ever spent a winter in the Northern Hemisphere at a latitude of 42° …
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“Ah, but after the sunset, the dusk and the twilight, when shadows of night start to fall. They roll back the sidewalk precisely at ten and people who live there are not seen again.” ~John …
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“It was Kansas City but it was North Carolina I wanted; whole hog smoked low and slow over fruit woods and doused liberally with a vinegar-based sauce. It was North Carolina but it was Texas …
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Whether it’s movies, Uber drivers or restaurants, human beings seem to predisposed to take stock in rankings and ratings. Be it a one- to four-star rating method or any other numerical or graphical rating system, …
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“Texas. It’s Like A Whole Other Country.” That slogan, conceived by the Texas Tourism Department, appeared on television commercials, billboards, advertisements and even license plates. It was such a hit that the Texas Department of …
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Roswell, New Mexico is a stodgy conservative town where sidewalks are rolled up early. Change comes to the state’s fifth largest city as slowly as the twangy, lazy cadence of a Texas drawl. So does …
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In this age of “fake news,” biased media slants and unabashed tell-alls, the one recent headline which has pleased me most comes from Bloomberg. Splashed in bold typeface was the eye-catching lead “Mom-and-Pop Joints Are …
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Garduños just can’t seem to keep up with the Joneses, at least in terms of familial propagation. The 2010 United States Census indicates more than a million instances (1,425,470 to be precise) of the surname …
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“Is there a sound on Earth as joyous as the pat-pat-pat from a Salvadoran kitchen, the gentle rhythm of a cook slapping together a pupusa that just happens to be yours?” ~Jonathan Gold Pulitzer Prize-Winning …
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Hollywood’s movie studio system of the 1920s and 30s contractually required its greatest glitterati to remain within 100 miles of Tinseltown’s studio during production. Because of this “two-hour rule,” such stars as Cary Grant, Debbie Reynolds, …
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Not everyone appreciated my friend Bob’s stark honesty as much as I did. For nearly twelve years, Bob was my most trusted source for information on the Santa Fe dining scene. He was also a …
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California may not have invented the hamburger, but a strong case could be made that no state has and continues to evolve what is arguably America’s most sacrosanct food. With more than 6,000 burger restaurants, California has …
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How many times have you heard a transplant to the Land of Enchantment say it just doesn’t feel like Christmas without snow? Some of you expats dream of a white Christmas, just like the ones …
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